Royal Mail to pay £100,000 in damages to whistleblower

20 Oct 2022

Royal Mail has been ordered to pay more than £100,000 to an employee due to bullying and unfair dismissal after she blew the whistle on potential fraudulent activity relating to bonuses.

Kam Jhuti alleged that she suffered a long-running bullying campaign by her boss after raising concerns that a colleague she was shadowing was not following Ofcom guidance, and was breaching Royal Mail’s bonus policy.

The Employment Tribunal confirmed that Jhuti was bullied, harrassed and intimidated by the superior to whom she reported her concerns, and who appeared to also benefit from the potential fraud. Jhuti told the Tribunal she had suffered severe depression and post-traumatic stress disorder as a result of her treatment, which included anxiety and regular panic attacks.

The original hearing took place in 2015 and went to the Supreme Court in 2019, which was told Jhuti started work as a £50,000 a year media specialist in Royal Mail's MarketReach unit in London in September 2013.

In November, she emailed her manager to report her concerns that a colleague was defrauding the company, to which he sent a 'sinister' email to his boss, stating that Jhuti 'has to be aware she is making quite strong and serious allegations'. Widmer subsequently had a four-hour meeting with Jhuti, telling her that if her accusations were untrue it would 'impact' on her job. The court heard Jhuti 'realised' that if she were to pursue the issue, her job would be put 'at risk' and that when the meeting resumed, Jhuti subsequently 'apologised repeatedly' and agreed to Widmer's suggestion she should email him, admitting she had 'made a mistake' and retract the allegations.

In terms of managing whistleblowing complaints, managers should:

Promote an open, transparent culture that encourage employees to act on and report any concerns.
Ensure that employees who raise genuine concerns about harmful practices that they come across in their work are taken seriously.
Ensure that employees who raise issues are not regarded as troublemakers and are not penalised or put at any detriment.
Listen to and thoroughly investigate every concern raised by an employee.

The Tribunal has now recommended that Royal Mail pay £109,065 in compensation, and £12,500 in aggravated damages. Aggravated damages apply in situations where the court deems an act of discrimination to have been high-handed, malicious, insulting or oppressive. The final amount will be determined between the parties at a later date.

The judgment stated:

“The impact of the campaign of bullying, intimidation and harassment by Mr Widmer in this case has undoubtedly been profound…While, as a rule, we try to avoid language which might be deemed intemperate, it is nonetheless true to say that the respondent’s treatment of the claimant has destroyed the claimant’s life. Furthermore, all of the medical professionals are clear that the resolution of these employment tribunal proceedings is necessary as a prerequisite to the claimant beginning to make any sort of recovery.”

A Royal Mail spokesperson said:

“Royal Mail has a zero-tolerance approach to bullying, harassment or discrimination of any kind. We value the work and commitment of all individuals who work in our business. This is a long-running case that relates to matters arising a number of years ago. We are now reviewing this decision. It would not be appropriate to comment further at this stage.”